Judge tosses lawsuit filed by inmate who cracked tooth on M&M

Juan Carlos Gonzalez, 43, sued the Collier County jail about a year and a half after he said he bit down on a "rock encrusted in chocolate" in November 2010.

CCSO

It didn't melt in his mouth. Or in his hand.

Instead, a peanut M&M cracked the filling and another tooth of a Collier County inmate, who sued the Naples Jail Center earlier this month for failing to fix his not-so-sweet tooth.

On Monday, a federal judge didn't bite on a lawsuit filed by Juan Carlos Gonzalez, tossing out the case and calling it "fatally flawed."

Gonzalez, 43, sued the jail about a year and a half after he said he bit down on a "rock encrusted in chocolate" in November 2010. He alleged that he requested dental care from jail staff but was denied.

In his lawsuit, Gonzalez provided a detailed account of his dental damage, as well as his communications with the insurers representing Mars Inc., maker of the iconic candy.

Gonzalez said he bought a pack of peanut M&M's from the jail commissary in November 2010, ten months after he was arrested on eight felony charges ranging from burglary to grand theft to fraud. When Gonzalez bit down on the suspect M&M, it fractured a permanent filling and part of a left molar, he said. Ever since, Gonzalez said, he has had to chew exclusively on the right side of his mouth.

Weeks after the painful bite, Gonzalez wrote Mars' headquarters in Hackettstown, N.J., saying he had been an "honest and well dedicated consumer of M&M's candies for well over 30 years" who recently "had the worst and most terrible experience of my life with the discovery found inside one chocolate M&M's candy."

Gonzalez asked for Mars to pay for his dental work and sent the M&M in question to the company. An official from Liberty Mutual, which represented Mars, wrote in December 2010 that the "object has been identified as chocolate buildup" and that the company apologized for the inconvenience.

The Liberty Mutual official requested dental records from Gonzalez, which he provided. But Gonzalez alleges Liberty Mutual didn't follow up after the request.

Gonzalez requested compensation for his dental work, as well as pain and suffering, in his lawsuit.

In his order, Judge John E. Steele wrote that Gonzalez's claims don't "amount to a deprivation of a right secured under the United States Constitution or federal law."